The invention concerns an apparatus for separating fillets from the backbones of beheaded, slaughtered fish having open abdominal cavities, cutting through the web left round the backbone by abdominal and dorsal knives, the fish being transported on transport saddles, comprising an upper bone guide, a lower bone guide and a separating unit which comprises, for detaching the fillets from the backbone, a separating means with which is associated a corresponding counter support, wherein the separating unit is movable out of a standby position into a working position and back. Furthermore the invention concerns a filleting machine for filleting beheaded, slaughtered fish having open abdominal cavities, comprising dorsal knives for exposing the back spokes as far as the backbone, abdominal knives for exposing the belly spokes in the tail region as far as the backbone, an apparatus for cutting the flank bones free, an apparatus for separating the fillets from the backbone, cutting through the web left round the backbone by abdominal and dorsal knives, an endless conveyor for transport of the fish tail first and a number of fish saddles arranged on the conveyor for reliably receiving the fish in their abdominal cavities.
Such apparatuses are used in the fish-processing industry to fillet fish automatically, particularly the salmon species. The fish are usually transported by means of transport saddles to the individual processing stations, inter alia the apparatus for separating fillets from the backbone. An essential working step is complete separation of fillets which have already been partly detached from the backbone by means of belly cuts and back cuts. After performing the belly cuts and back cuts, a web remains round the backbone. By means of the apparatus for separating the fillets from the backbone, which is also referred to as a separating tool, the web can be separated from the tail region, that is, the tail fin, up to the beginning of the abdominal cavity, so that the fillets are completely detached from the backbone and fall e.g. onto a conveyor belt or the like arranged below the apparatus. The upper and lower bone guides serve to keep and guide the fish in the optimum processing position on the transport saddle. The separating unit is usually arranged on both sides of the fish to be processed, so that the fillets can be separated from the backbone in parallel or with a time delay.
German patent document DE 198 81 497 C1 discloses a filleting machine in which the apparatus for separating the fillets from the backbone has, apart from the necessary bone guides, a separating unit which has two parallel, spaced-apart circular knives. The circular knives are movable out of an upper position above the lower bone guide into a lower position and vice versa, the circular knives further being displaceable in the axial direction relative to each other. The yielding movement in the axial direction takes place against a spring element. The cutting counter supports for the circular knives are arranged in the region of the lower bone guide independently of the circular knives. The cutting counter supports for their part are pivotable about a pivot point. In the processing position the circular knives are each located between an inner and an outer cutting counter support. In order to move out of the lower processing position into the upper standby (or yielding) position, the circular knives are lifted, while the cutting counter supports remain in the lower position. For yielding, the cutting counter supports are mounted rotatably at their own pivot point. In other words, the circular knives are movable independently of the cutting counter support. As a result, particularly during processing the circular knives run up to the cutting counter supports, as a result of which the circular knife, cutting counter support and fin guide plate are subject to wear. Also, control of the known separating unit is expensive particularly due to the large number of elements to be controlled.